Nelson Mandela was sentenced to life in prison by a South African court on June 12, 1964, after being found guilty of sabotage and conspiracy to violently overthrow the apartheid government. While Mandela’s imprisonment was criticized in the U.S. and abroad, at the time of his arrest, U.S. policy towards South Africa was more concerned with preserving access to South Africa’s natural resources than directly confronting apartheid. The five documents included in today’s posting, all part of the Digital National Security Archive’s South Africa collection, provide a glimpse of the U.S. walking a tightrope between strategic concerns and human rights issues at the time of Mandela’s arrest, and contextualize the outpouring of response to Mandela’s recent passing.

In November 1975 while Angola was battling for independence and internal and external forces were competing for primacy, Cuban forces militarily intervened in support of the leftist MPLA movement and against US-supported movements.“By the end of 1975 the Cuban military in Angola numbered more than 25,000 troops. Following the retreat of Zaire and South Africa, Cuban forces remained in Angola to support the MPLA government against UNITA in the continuing Angolan Civil War.” Continue reading this...

A murder conviction raises fresh doubts about a government outsourcer’s competence and integrity.

Last November a 42 year-old pharmaceutical worker from Thailand took part in a conference about HIV treatment at Glasgow’s Clyde Auditorium. Her name was Khanokporn Satjawat. A G4S guard checked Satjawat’s ID. He didn’t like her manner. Later he followed her into the toilets and bludgeoned her to death with a fire extinguisher.

US President Barack Barack Obama’s weekend trip to South Africa may have the desired effect of slowing the geopolitical realignment of Pretoria to the Brazil-India-Russia-China-South Africa (BRICS) axis. That shift to BRICS has not, however, meant deviation from the hosts’ political philosophy, best understood as “talk left, walk right” since it mixes anti-imperialist rhetoric with pro-corporate policies. Continue reading this...

An elite class of Black millionaires has “accumulate wealth at the expense of the vast majority” of South Africa’s people, said community organizer and researcher Molefi Ndlovu, on the latest edition of Black Agenda Television. These “Black Diamonds,” as they are called, have become “a sort of middleman, people who push the envelop for the people who hold real power in the country.”

“We reaffirm the character of the ANC as a disciplined force of the left, a multi-class mass movement and an internationalist movement with an anti-imperialist outlook” — so said Jacob Zuma, orating to his masses at the year’s largest African National Congress celebration, in Durban on January 12, 2013.[1]

The late, great Jabu Khanyile and Bayete, one of the best groups to emerge in the late 1980s-90s. Beautiful music. This track from the album of the same name, 1993. Also from the same album, ‘Thabo’ became an unofficial ‘anthem’ of the anti-Apartheid struggle, and is an all-time favourite of mine.